Saturday, June 18, 2011

Beating up on them and Jim Leyland was a helluva lot of fun on Friday night.

I admit it, I still haven't forgetton Leyland's quitting on the Rockies after the 1999 season. Forgiven? Sure. I mean, it's his life, so it's not really an unforgivable thing, but certainly not forgotten. That means it will always be a little extra satisfying when the Rockies clean his clock, which is exactly what they did here.

Charlie Blackmon: 4-for-4, two runs and two RBI. He's not providing a lot of power, but damn, he's getting the bat on the ball consistently and he's finding himself on base multiple times each game. That's helping the Rockies extend their lineup. For the first two months the offense was basicially limited to 2-5 in the order. Now with Blackmon hitting well at seven, it's opening things up for guys like Ty Wigginton and Chris Iannetta to see better pitches be factors.

Chris Nelson: As I've said before, the ball jumps off Nelson's bat. As Andrew Fisher of Purple Row pointed out to me, his bat speed was compared to Gary Sheffield when he was selected in the first round several years ago. We agree it's not that special, but some of his swings are absolutely gorgeous. Good results follow those swings.

Other contributers: Todd Helton and Seth Smith each collected two hits. But it was mostly the three men listed above that did the damage.

Jason Hammel: I bet he could get used to pitching in front of the A lineup. So many times he's stuck with the C and D lineup, pitches his ass off and has nothing to show for it. This time he was OK. He had a rough start, but avoided significant damage, which was huge because it allowed the offense to get on track.

He then had four really dominant innings against an excellent offense from the second to the fifth. And then he faltered at the end, but Tracy probably stuck with him a little longer than he normally would due to the large lead, so I really have a tough time saying he was bad. He wasn't great. He was OK. OK was plenty good.

Overall: Three straight excellent TEAM performances. Contributions up and down the order. Good enough pitching. Let's keep this roll going!